


Canada Dreamin'

by UseYourDelusion



Series: You Can't Always Get What You Want [3]
Category: X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-29
Updated: 2014-09-29
Packaged: 2018-02-19 07:08:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2379365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UseYourDelusion/pseuds/UseYourDelusion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, the Savage Land is dangerous. Sometimes it's kinda boring. That way, there's plenty of time to fight, to talk and to forgive each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Canada Dreamin'

**Author's Note:**

> This one references the events of Uncanny X-men 115 (1978). This issue has been reprinted numerous times, so finding it shouldn't be a problem; synopsis is also available online.
> 
> This story didn't have any beta, so be warned.

I dream about winter. Not this warmish, mild Westchester, NY bullshit with slightly cold winds and a dash of snow, if you're lucky. No, I dream of real, honest-to-God Canadian winter. In a real, thick Canadian forest. Air so clean and cold it freezes your lungs from inside when you breathe it in. Everything covered in snow; shades of white and icy blue everywhere. Pristine, cloudless sky, sun shining so bright you can't go out without sunglasses. And, of course, a small log house lost in the endless seas of snow-covered trees near a frozen lake, a perfect retreat.

I dream about taking Scott there, if only for a week or two. I dream about waking up with the first rays of sun and feeling his warm body near mine, lips slightly touching my shoulder. I dream about having breakfast together - the sweetest, strongest coffee you can find, artery-clogging fry-up of eggs and bacon, and toast with thick smatterings of butter and jam. I dream about us going out in the forest for hunting, then going back and preparing the dinner, then, after the dinner, making love while the fire burns in the fireplace.

Then I wake up, and remember that we're stuck in the Savage Land. It's endless tropical heat. And Summers hates me.

We don't talk much, not after what I did. When we do, it's strictly business. And yet, I see his face slightly cringe whenever it happens. And every time it breaks my heart.

I want to talk to him. To apologize. To get this off my chest. Sometimes I want to go to Kurt and simply tell him everything. As a priest, he'd understand. He'd even give me some advice. He'd never tell anyone, too. But then I remember that confused and scared look on Scott's face. I can't tell anyone about this. 

Sometimes I wonder if it all could have happened differently. If maybe, just maybe, there is a parallel universe out there somewhere, where mutants are treated like people, and there is no need in the X-Men. That in this universe Scott and I just live together, like a normal couple would. Nice house with a garden. Job that doesn't involve saving the world and dealing with psychopaths like Magneto. I'd go for something safe and boring, a doctor, maybe. Or a corporate lawyer. Or maybe we'd still be X-Men, fighting side by side. But not hating each other, not having to hide. 

I like to think that this universe exists. It's pretty much all I do these days. Thinking. Dreaming. Not my favorite type of activity. Too much of it makes you stupid. But life in the Savage Land is, as we all were surprised to find out, is actually not that full of adventure. It happens, yes, but in between are long days and sometimes weeks of doing nothing. 

"Have you seen Ororo, Logan?"

I look at Summers, and even with the visor on his face I can tell he's trying not to look at me.

"Nope". 

He walks away and I go back to whatever I was not doing; that's all our conversations for the past two weeks in a nutshell.

Then I hear Ororo screaming, and there is no time to think. I only have time to run. I pick up smell of Storm - old and barely distinguishable, but it is still there. The farther I run, the stronger it becomes, until it gets so strong that I know she must be nearby. She is. But not alone.

I know that creature from the biology textbook I borrowed from Hank. A pterosaur, a giant flying reptile. Not that it really matters, but I like to know whom I need to kill. I rush to Storm and attack.

***

For a brief second, I felt pain - but not clean and sharp pain of bullets and blades ripping through muscles. It was this strange pulsating headache, with nausea and the feeling you get when you realize your brain does not control your body. On a purely physical level, I'd give it 6 out of 10. But overall, it was one of those things that distinguishes bloodthirsty assholes like me from really sick puppies, like, say, Magneto.

Mind control.

All I could see were dark and twisted creatures attacking me. Then there was Jean, her terrified gaze, all I could hear was her screaming for help. There was a man attacking her, too. And that was all I needed. The last thing I could remember was the sound of my claws popping. After that it was just blind fury. And then, pure pain, consuming me like fire. Red flashes of pain everywhere. And when it was done with me, the blackness of oblivion.

"What the hell, Logan?!"

Still not dead yet. 

***

Scott's kneeling beside me, there's a cut on his cheek that's pretty bad, not through-and-through, but still deep, and the smell of his blood is so overwhelming I just know there have to be more cuts. There are. All I can think of is to help him right now, but when I reach out to him, he moves away. 

That's when I realize what happened. 

That's when I wish I was dead.

I hear voices; it's Ororo, who's safe now, it's Sean, it's Pyotr... They all run up to Scott and to Kurt, whom I've knocked out, so eager to help them that they don't notice me going away.

Good thing.

***

That night I felt tired, but couldn't sleep. My heart kept thumping in my chest, and a voice deep inside me made it beat even faster. This voice sounded like my own, yet wasn't mine completely, it talked the way a prosecutor would talk, about what a terrible wreck of a human being I was. No, worse, not even completely human. And boy, that inner prosecutor knew me so good and spoke so well that if I were among the jurors, I'd found myself guilty on all counts in a minute.

The worst thing was that this prosecutor guy was not going to shut up anytime soon. He knew me, and I knew him too, and I knew that once this guy started, he couldn't shut up. The only thing to do was to drown him in whiskey or to cave in and do what he wanted.

There's no whiskey in Savage Land.

I covered myself up and went out of the cabin. Didn't go to Scott's because I knew he wasn't there. There was only one place he could be.

I found him near the lake, as I knew I would, all bandaged and stitched up, sitting on a rock and looking into the sky. This time he heard me approach and turned his head to look at me.

"What are you doing here, Logan?"

"Wanted to apologize."

"You don't need to. You were mind-controlled. It was Lykos, not you."

"Not about that. About the other thing I did."

He didn't answer immediately.

"I just wanted to say... If you want to hate me, you have every right to."

"Okay," he said at last, "Apology accepted".

For a while we stayed in complete silence, looking at glistening waters of the lake. Scott didn't say a thing, didn't look at me. 

"Logan, can I ask you something?"

"Sure thing, bub. Fire away."

"Do you hate me?"

"Do you want me to?"

Scott's smile was bitter and strange. "It's just... Sometimes you act like you do hate me. I wonder if you really do. If everybody else does."

"No, Scott. I don't hate you. Sometimes you really piss me off. Sometimes I want to mess with your head. But hate you? Nah. Sometimes I wish I could. Would have made this all much more simple."

Scott didn't answer, so I went on.

"And I don't think the others hate you. When I first got into the X-Men I didn't like you at all, ya know? So I started asking people around. Maybe, I thought, there would be someone who shares my opinion on you. But they all liked you. They all were loyal to you. I think they all still are."

"Even after all that's happened?"

"That wasn't your fault, Scott."

"I feel like it is. I was the leader of the team. I was supposed to get everybody out alive. I didn't."

"You still did your best, didn't you?"

"What I did was not enough."

"You gotta stop thinking like that, Summers. You're starting to sound like Parker."

"Who?"

"Parker? Some kid I know. Good kid. Smart kid. But he has thing in his head, about great power and great responsibility. Blames everything on himself. Kinda like you, in fact. But you can't live this way and stay sane. Not for long, at least."

"So... What you're saying is I should accept the fact that I screwed up."

"No. What I'm saying is you didn't screw up. You did your best. It didn't work out the way you hoped it would. That happens. A good leader has to accept both wins and losses, and build up on them. That's the only true way to greatness. Or so I'm told."

"Did you ever have to do it? Accept your losses?"

"Sure I did," I tried to smile. "Everybody does. I knew lots of good guys in 'Nam. A lot of them I couldn't save. You have to learn to live with it."

"That was at war, though."

"This is war, too. Just smaller. Not between states, just between people. I know you and Prof don't like to think about it in these terms, but this is what it looks like from where I'm standing."

For a long time, Scott looked at the water surface.

"I guess you're right," he said. "We are at war. It's just... When you put it in those terms, everything we do seems much less... noble. Makes you question everything."

"I know. I might be wrong, though. After all, war is all I remember, and I don't remember that much. I'd take my own advice with a grain of salt, if I were you, Slim."

"I never take any advices from you, so you have nothing to worry about," Scott said, smiling. 

Seeing Scott smile was good, even if the joke wasn't a particularly funny one.

I sat down on the rock beside him, close enough so I could smell him perfectly without having to take deep loud breaths; he didn't seem to mind. For a while, I just sat there quietly, taking in his smell, memorizing it, savoring it.

"Logan?"

"Yeah?"

"I just wanted to tell you..."

"Go on."

"I know you said I have the right to hate you... I just want you to know that I don't."

As he stood up, I could feel the heat of his skin so close to mine. There was a salty, metallic smell of caked blood still lingering on his skin, and, mixed with it, some bitter green ointment the locals used to treat wounds and cuts. I breathed in his smell once again, and almost lost it. I raised my hand, almost ready to touch him. But then I remembered what happened earlier. How scared he was of me.

"Thank you, Scott".

***

For the first time in days, I go to my cabin and I sleep well and sound.

I dream of winter.


End file.
